Sly Stallone Hits Riot-Prone Paris Suburbs

Sylvester Stallone is the latest American movie star to visit France's riot-plagued suburbs. The visit from the Stallone, in Paris to promote his newest movie, Expendables, comes as part of an odd US attempt to reach out to disaffected youth in the city's multi-racial Rosny-sous-Bois. John Travolta and Samuel L. Jackson have also been in the Paris suburbs recently, and the American ambassador is a regular visitor.

"The Americans are betting on socio-demographic change in France," a French sociologist tells the Independent."They reckon that the French elites—now white and aging—will have to change, and the leaders of tomorrow may come from the periphery of the system." Youth leaders, in fact, say that the American interest in them contrasts sharply with the indifference they're used to from their own government.
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